The Sims is one of those game series with rare universal appeal. Some like to use the games to create neat little houses, others like to develop families and micromanage every aspect of their existence, and then there are those miscreants who like to invite other Sims over and build walls around them to starve them to death in revenge for calling during nap time. Five years and 16 expansion packs since the last major release, EA is finally moving on to The Sims 3. EA Redwood Shores took over developmental duties for the third Sims title while series creator Maxis worked on other things, but that’s not a bad thing. The Sims 3 adds plenty of new features, extra depth and other refinements without overcomplicating matters or reducing the series’ trademark accessibility. Simply put, The Sims 3 is the best game in the series yet.

EA Redwood Shores hasn’t set out to reinvent the wheel – The Sims 3 plays pretty much as you would expect it to, but the new features and refinements serve to enhance gameplay, particularly for core gamers, without losing any of the wide appeal and accessibility that got the franchise to this point. Not all players will react positively to some of the game’s new features – particularly the new Sims store, which charges real currency for in-game objects and the omission of some expansion pack content (like university), but there’s nothing that will send players running back to the older games in a hurry.

The Sims 3’s new content hits you in the face the moment you start a game. The process of creating a Sim has been greatly expanded; you still handle the crafting of their physique and personality, but there is much greater depth of customisation. Sliders help players fine tune the various physical attributes of their Sim, like skin colour and facial features. Players can also create a style for their Sim’s clothing from various patterns. The biggest change comes in defining a Sim’s personality. Rather than simply assigning points to a number of attributes, The Sims 3 also lets you define personality traits. Traits determine the way your Sim acts, what they want from life and many other aspects of their existence. There are over 60 traits available, five of which can be assigned to each Sim. Traits can have pretty astounding impacts on everyday situations, making for all sorts of fun – we recommend creating a Sim with the evil trait and watching them have fun ruining everyone else’s fun or taking “evil showers” and “evil naps”.

Perhaps the most profound change in The Sims 3 is the way the game world works. In the first two games, players were restrained to controlling their Sim in one place at a time, be it their house or a downtown area. The Sims 3 does away with that tired old structure, replacing it with a fully explorable world. There’s no loading to break it up either – your Sim can just walk out of the house and catch a cab to a friend’s house, downtown shops, the gym and many other places. It makes the world of The Sims seem that much more meaningful, as though your Sims are now a part of a living world. This makes it seem like there’s a whole lot more to do in the game, and you no longer have to sit through awfully long load sequences. Some players might find it annoying that all Sims age at the same time, whereas before it was restricted to just the Sims on the block, but the ageing system can be tweaked or deactivated to get around this.


Previous iterations of The Sims have demanded a lot from the player in terms of micromanaging every aspect of your Sim’s life. The AI of your Sims has received a major boost in The Sims 3; not only can your Sims be practically self sufficient, but their behaviour is most interesting to just sit back and observe. This is best highlighted in situations with multiple Sims, particularly when you’ve created interesting personalities for them. Putting a few Sims with clashing personalities in an uneasy situation often yields amusing results. The only thing that hasn’t improved on the AI front is pathfinding – your Sims can have a heck of a time figuring out their way home if they’ve gone out.

There’s a multitude of ways to play The Sims 3; you can play as the typical surburban family unit with the hard-working parents and 2.4 children, a carefree bachelor making a living off painting or writing, or the evil workaholic criminal mastermind – it’s really up to you. You could even play as a homeless family if you’re feeling particularly cruel. Each Sim has rather typical needs and wants, but now also has a lifetime goal, defined by his or her personality traits. These goals vary quite a lot – one Sim might just want to start a family, while another might want to reach the top of their chosen career path. There are also random short term goals which pop up throughout the deal, completion of which gives your Sim a small mood boost and points that can be used to gain new abilities, like a steel bladder or skill boosts. It doesn’t have the negative side of the equation like the second game, though. This system constantly makes you feel like you’re working towards something in your Sim’s life, which should please players who felt that previous games lacked direction.


Your Sims are always going to want to make progress in their lives; getting that next promotion, gaining new skills or simply making new friends. Players can dictate what their Sim is doing at work, which helps to make new friends or impress your bosses for promotions. More money means being able to make improvements to your house, buying new furniture and enjoying the finer things in life. The tools for building and placing furniture work much the same as before, but players have more freedom with how they align furniture. There are plenty of appliances, furnishings and other knick knacks with which to fill your humble abode, but The Sims 3 features significantly less items than its predecessors. You have the new online store to thank for that. Players can now spend real money on SimPoints, which are exchanged for new items to be put into their home. There are a few free items there (including a whole extra town), but EA seem like they’re holding out on us.

It’s a shame that major aspects of The Sims 2 expansion packs like pet ownership, seasonal weather and university have all been omitted from The Sims 3 base game. We all knew that a new game would be followed by multiple expansion packs, but the possibility that EA could soon be selling us back the same content that featured in the previous game’s expansions is a bit dubious. One can only hope that the integration of future expansion packs is a bit smoother than it is in The Sims 2 – running the game with multiple expansion packs is a good test of one’s patience.


From a technical standpoint, The Sims 3 may not seem like a huge upgrade over the previous game, but it’s highly scalable and there’s a lot more going on behind the scenes. The Sims 3 will run pretty well on any computer released in the last three years – obviously, the newer the PC, the better it will look and run. Since the whole game world is accessible at any time, there haven’t been quite as many significant visual upgrades to the Sims’ appearance or the level of detail in the world, but there is a noticeable improvement across the board. It’s not entirely smooth sailing though, even on a powerful machine – switching between locations can cause the game’s performance to tail off momentarily. There’s also a nice soundtrack at play, full of the same style of jolly tunes which have characterised the game to date.

EA Redwood Shores has done a fantastic job, picking up where Maxis left off to create a more meaningful, more immersive Sims experience. There’s so much content packed into The Sims 3 that it’s difficult to cover it all – it’s something you really need to discover for yourself. There’s a few drawbacks in the lack of items, omissions from expansion packs, and the prospect of heavy nickel and diming for new items, but you won’t think of those things when you’re busy managing a family of eight Sims or plotting to rule the world. The Sims 3 is everything we hoped it would be and more.